The world of The Last Airbender consists of four nations: the Earth Kingdom, the Water Tribe, the Fire Nation, and the Air Nomads. Each society has people capable of manipulating or "bending" the element that is their namesake. Only one person in each generation, the Avatar, is capable of bending all of the elements; their duty is to be a mediator and peacekeeper of the world.

The film's hero is Avatar Aang, an Air Nomad boy who froze himself in an iceberg to avoid his destiny. One hundred years later, he reawakens to find that his people have been massacred by the Fire Nation, which is trying to take over the world. Seeking to take his calling seriously and challenge the Fire Lord, he journeys with his new friends, Water Tribe teenagers Katara and Sokka, to the North Pole to find a Waterbending master to learn the art. But news that the Avatar has returned spreads quickly, and he is hunted by both Prince Zuko, the disgraced son of the Fire Lord, and Admiral Zhao, the Fire Lord's second in command.

The Last Airbender provides examples of the following tropes:

Movie Aang spends most of his time angsting over his job as the Avatar and being the lastAirbender. Cartoon Aang, while not a stranger to angst, is The Pollyanna at his core. The first episode made a joke of the "waking up weak" scene, where the movie plays it seriously.

Sokka is also a lot more serious, even when compared with his more dry and sarcastic book 1 self. To the point where despite being the definitive comic relief in the series, he doesn't crack a single joke in the movie.

Adaptational Attractiveness: Zuko's scar has changed from covering half his face to a barely noticable red line over his eye. This is more an example of shifting things to work in the new format (film) where the extremely stylized scar might not be as believable. Additionally, Zuko is already considered attractive despite the disfigurement.

In the series, the Earth Kingdom prisoners are trapped on a rig out at sea, and need Katara's help because they have no obvious earth to bend. In the film, the Earth Kingdom prisoners are in a garden-variety landbound prison camp, and need Aang's help because it apparently just hasn't occurred to them that the ground here also counts as earth. Admittedly, both explain that the Earthbenders had their spirits broken and no longer wanted any trouble (even in the show when given access to their element the Earthbenders didn't want to fight the prison guards). It's only that the explanation for their broken spirits (no earth to bend) wasn't present.

In the movie, Aang explains to Katara that one of the reasons he didn't want to be the Avatar is that the Avatar isn't ever allowed to have a family, something that was actively contradicted by the series. In the TV series, Zuko's discovery that he is the great-grandson of Avatar Roku is a major factor in his decision to join Team Avatar, while Avatar Kuruk's big motivation was getting back the woman he loved from the clutches of Koh the Face Stealer, Avatar Kyoshi had a daughter who ruled over Kyoshi Island after her mother, and the idea that being the Avatar is something to make you popular with the ladies was repeated several times. Not to mention Aang spends a good amount of the series trying to invoke a romance between him and Katara. This doesn't happen in the film, though the movie probably wasn't long enough to have it as it took days for her to even ask for his name.

The most famous is in the retelling of the episode "Imprisoned". In the show, the Earthbenders are trapped in a metal ship out at sea, far away from any sources of earth to bend. In the movie, they're imprisoned in a camp on land, which would be like building a prison and then giving all the prisoners assault rifles with infinite ammunition... and then the prisoners not using them for no adequately explained reason.

The Firebenders in the movie need existing fire to bend, meaning they could potentially be weakened or defeated by extinguishing the defenders' fires. This wouldn't stand out so much if one of the characters didn't actually suggest it as a tactic, which nobody follows through on at all.

Aang, a happy-go-lucky and eager kid in the series, is a quiet, brooding, and somewhat angsty boy in the film.

Sokka, being both the Comic Relief and The Smart Guy in the show, has little in the way of character traits in the film and does little beyond receive exposition.

Admiral Zhao is more confident and violent in the series, while in the film he is more indecisive to the point he often consults the Fire Lord on every decision and he runs away after Iroh makes fire from thin air.

Fire Lord Ozai, the de facto Evil Overlord, is shown as a curious individual in the movie. He doesn't appear as hateful and cruel, but contemplative and decisive. He even shows remorse for his son Zuko's banishment by warning Zhao that Zuko will be over him when he returns.

Master Pakku. Instead of being a sexist prick, he's just a wise martial arts sensei.

Iroh. In the movie, while he retains his role as mentor to the afflicted Zuko, he is not as comedic and laid-back as his series counterpart.

Zuko. He may be like his cartoon counterpart, but he is not deadset/blind in his chase of the Avatar. He barely lost his temper (a famous character trait for Season 1 Zuko) and actually felt remorse for others, which is shown when he apologizes to an unconscious Katara in the movie, whereas in the series he smugly rubs in his victory over her.

Adaptational Superpower Change: The Firebenders require a source of fire to bend; not so in the animated series. The reasoning behind this was because the director felt that the Firebenders were too overpowered when compared to the other elemental benders in the show. Unfortunately, the change depowered Firebenders to the point that it makes all the other benders into Adaptational Wimps, since the Fire Nation retains dominance over the other nations despite having to rely on easily-extinguishable torches for their ammo.

In the cartoons, Firebenders can create flames, while in the film all but the very best require existing flames to bend.

Earthbenders have had their spirits broken by the Fire Nation and do not attempt to resist until Aang rallies them. In the series, they do not resist because they're kept away from earth.

During their escape it takes six earthbenders several seconds to move then throw a small rock at a firebender. A feat that, in the series could be accomplished by a single earthbender in an instant. It would have been faster to just pick it up and throw it manually.

Katara. In the series, her fight with Zuko at the North Pole is an extended battle that Katara would have won but for the Diabolus ex Machina of the sun rising just as she was about to overwhelm Zuko, strengthening the latter's bending. In the film, it's a borderline Curb-Stomp Battle on Katara's end — she blocks two attacks before Zuko floors her with ease.

Age Lift: The elderly Monk Gyatso is portrayed here by the much younger Damon Gupton.

Alternate Continuity: The events of this film take place in an alternate timeline separate from the main Franchise's timeline.

The Artifact: The Ocean Spirit, due to Aang merging with it being cut from the movie, it has no major role.

Ascended Extra: While he is the Big Bad, before the third season of the show Ozai had almost no direct involvement with the storyline; he was The Faceless in the first season and a Face Framed in Shadow in the second, with only one brief scene that wasn't a flashback. The movie, based on the first season, gives him several scenes with Admiral Zhao, including being the driving force behind Zhao's "kill the moon" plan. Though oddly enough, there's still one scene that's clearly trying to hide his face, after we've already seen it. Presumably the decision to show it occurred midway through production and Shyamalan just forgot to redo it.

As You Know: The primary mode of exposition — Zhao even uses these exact words on multiple occasions. One major example is when Zuko, travelling incognito with his uncle, he asks a child to tell the story of how Zuko got his scar. He does so to make a point to his uncle, as he needed to capture the Avatar to reclaim some peace of mind before thinking about settling down or "pretty girls".

Attack Its Weak Point: Subverted. Despite movie-verse Firebenders being forced to rely on easily extinguishable sources of flame to bend, nobody ever thinks to put the fires out. Made worse by the fact that the water tribe is told to douse their torches before the Final Battle so the Firebenders won't have any extra ammo, and nobody does. The torches are still burning during the battle.

Beauty Is Never Tarnished: As mentioned above, some feel that Zuko's scar is this because of how downplayed it is. Others feel that it is more realistic than the wildly exaggerated scar from the cartoon.

Big Damn Heroes: Katara shows up just in time to rescue Aang from Zuko after Zuko had taken him from her earlier.

Big "NO!": Aang lets out a huge one after finding out his mentor Monk Gyatso died.

Broken Aesop: The film muddies the motivations and fate of Admiral Zhao. In the original, Zhao murdered the Moon Spirit for both tactical advantage (de-powering the other side) and his own ego (he wanted to be known to history as Zhao the Moon Slayer). In the movie, he is now trying for some vague idea of freeing Humans from the spirits' power, declaring that with his act, they are now the gods. He is the villain, so his already villainous act should now also look blatantly blasphemous. However, his final fate is also changed, from in the original series being dragged to his doom by the enraged Ocean Spirit to in the movie meeting his end by being caught and drowned in floating water by a team of Northern Waterbenders. So Zhao declares his contempt for the Spirits, and his fate is changed to be taken down by men. So was he blasphemous, a rebel, or something entirely different?

Aang, when Katara asks him how he ended up in the Southern Water Tribe's territory: "We were forced under the water of the ocean."

Attempting to list all the examples from the film would keep us here all night, but mention has to go to Aang using his Captain Obvious powers to save an entire village by reminding the Earthbenders they are in fact capable of Earthbending.

Chickification: Katara gets hit with a case of this. Where the series depicts her as a highly talented bender capable of going toe-to-toe with fairly skilled benders despite having no training, the film version blunders her attempts at bending so often that it renders her nearly completely useless and a couple of her defining moments of bravery and compassion from the series were given to Aang.

Coconut Super Powers: In the animated series, every single attack that a bender makes is with his or her bending — the only people who ever resort to actual physical attacks are those without bending. In the movie, however, even fights between benders, such as Aang and Zuko's fight scenes, include a much higher proportion of straight martial arts, presumably because it's cheaper than having every single blow be an effects shot.

The Dragon Spirit serves as a stand-in for Roku, Koh and even Guru Pathik with the appearance of Roku's pet dragon Fang.

According to the novelization, the Kyoshi Warriors (who are sadly removed in the final cut), rather than protecting the Kyoshi Island from intruders, they took over the roles for Jet and the Freedom Fighters.

The film version of Yue is composed of the series Yue and Arnook, by having her father written off as dead at the start of the movie.

Along with roles originally played by the animated Ozai, he played many roles of the animated Zhao. In some cases, the roles are jointly shared with the film Zhao, particularly the plan to eliminate the Ocean and Moon Spirits in the Siege of the North. The characterization for the animated Zhao is more closely depicted with this Ozai than with the film Zhao, e.g., sinister and devious, rather than cocky and ambitious.

On the other hand, the film version of Zhao is a spun-off character, personifying a younger Zhao who served as a junior Lieutenant under General Shu (and then found the hidden library), and apparently an illegitimate son of Zhao-Ozai composite, turning the relationship dynamics between "Zhao Jr." and Zuko similar to Edmund and Edgar in King Lear.

Compressed Adaptation: This is inevitable when you consider that Shyamalan is trying to compress ten hours of a TV series into a regular-length movie. The movie manages to condense episodes 1-3, 6, 13, and 19 and 20 (the first season two-part finale) into a rather tight series of events. Episode 4, in which the Kyoshi Warriors and Suki were introduced, was originally present but cut for the theatrical release. Everything else in the show is either simplified, vague, or presented through montage and voiceover.

Covers Always Lie: The title poster on this page shows Zuko with fire coming out of his hands. This would be perfectly normal for the animated series, but next to impossible in the film universe, where only the best benders (which Zuko doesn't count as yet) can generate fire.

Demoted to Extra: The film naturally has this by virtue of trying to condense twenty episodes into a hundred-minute movie.

Momo shows up long enough to be introduced, then occasionally shows up in the background a couple times. You could be forgiven for not believing him to have followed Aang after the introduction.

Appa was also demoted. He doesn't get a lot of screen time and is more of a mode of transportation than an actual character.

Haru and Tyro … ahem, Earthbending Boy and his father.

Jet is the small boy Zuko calls over to regale the story of the banished prince.

There's also Avatar Roku, who was a major player in the Avatar's quest in the show. In the movie, with the exception of a brief mention, he's completely removed and his mentor role to Aang is handled by a dragon … for some reason.

Despair Event Horizon: The reason given for the Earthbenders not escaping their prison, despite being surrounded by very bendable rock.

Dull Surprise: All the main characters react like this at various points.

Elemental Baggage: Firebending was the only bending art in the series that created their element, which the movie altered to require a fire source. The explanation, as provided by Iroh in the first episode, was that Firebending came from mixing air with your own body heat and energy. To some degree the same thing is true in the movie, except only masters can create fire. Firebenders can, without a flame source, generate sufficient heat from their fingertips to melt through ice.

Family-Unfriendly Death: Zhao via onscreen drowning from the hands of four random Waterbenders. Complete with seeing his lifeless body plopped down on screen.

Fantastic Racism: The Fire Nation believe themselves superior to the other elements, which was directly patterned off of Nazi Germany/Imperial Japan motifs in the source show. Ironic, considering Shyamalan's changes to the source material render them the most hindered by Elemental Baggage — extant fire is much rarer than water, earth, or air.

Flynning: In many cases it takes a lot of movement to produce very small amounts of bending, while the show's style had it as a natural extension of the body. It does appear to be a visual shorthand to differentiate the master benders from the novices: Aang, Pakku and Zuko are significantly more efficient in their respective element. If you look closely at her fight scene with Zuko, Katara's movements are far smoother and more efficient than her early attempt at bending when she wound up freezing Sokka, showing that she's made some progression. Shyamalan's reasoning is that he interprets bending as pumping up a lot of chi like an airsoft gun, then releasing it when you have enough.

Every Earth and Water person in the film suffers from this. Unlike the series, Firebenders (who aren't masters) need an available source of fire in order to bend it. This is all well and good, except none of the other characters ever thinks to put them out! Granted, some of the fire sources are fairly large, but nothing that couldn't be doused with a little effort. Taken to truly ridiculous extremes in the Earthbender camp when several Firebenders are literally bending from a single source they could not conceivably protect. Someone does give the order to douse the flames when the alarm bells sound … but apparently, they never got around to it, because all of the fires are still going during the battle.

The Earthbender slave camp was built on solid ground, as opposed to a metal refinery in the middle of the ocean as in the cartoon. That would be like making a prison in a gun factory. The only thing that prevented the Earthbenders from just breaking out of this prison was this trope as well.

Hilarious Outtakes: The DVD contains a gag reel with behind-the-scene shenanigans and on-set goofs. Most people say that this is funnier than the movie, including Jackson Rathbone actually acting like Sokka.

The entire Water Tribe at the climax of the movie. Knowing a Fire Nation invasion was imminent, the Water Tribe leader told everyone to put out every flame in the village to deprive the invading Firebenders of their ammunition. None of the fires was put out, including the one near the koi pond!

That pales in comparison to the Earthbenders, who are kept prisoner in a quarry filled with earth!

Informed Ability: Zhao was supposed to be a master Firebender. While the series showcased his powers, the movie didn't. For example, there is no Agni Kai between him and Zuko in the beginning and the end (the latter because Iroh talked Zuko out of it) and as he prepares to fight a quartet of unnamed Waterbenders, he got encased in a giant bubble and drowned to death.

Informed Deformity: Zuko's "disfiguring" scar is much less prominent in the film than it was in the show. It looked like part of his face was burned off in the series, while here it looks like he forgot to put sunblock under his eye or something.

Insane Troll Logic: After the large iceberg rises out of the sheet of ice in the middle of nowhere, Sokka advises Katara to not go near it as he believes it to be a Fire Nation trap.

It Is Pronounced "Tro-PAY"!: One of the more talked about changes Shyamalan made to things was the pronunciation of many of the names, in an attempt to be more in line with how they would be pronounced in Asian languages.

Names: Aang gets pronounced "Ahng", Sokka becomes "Soak-a", and Iroh becomes "Ee-roh". The way they're pronounced in the original is, respectively, to rhyme with "gang", like the sport, and as if he were a product by Apple.

Shyamalan also changed the pronunciation of the fire duel, "Agni Kai". It's now pronounced "Agni Ki" (as in key). This makes no sense as the creators specified they chose the word because it was the Japanese word for "meeting" so Shyamalan fixed nothing.

He also changed the typical English pronunciation of "avatar" to "ahvatar" (in some of the times it is said, anyway), even though it's still nothing like the original Indian pronunciation, which is something like "uhvathar".

Locking MacGyver in the Store Cupboard: Imprisoning Earthbenders in a quarry. The Fire Nation's stupidity is turned Up to Eleven here. At least in the show, they keep Earthbenders imprisoned on metal ships far out to sea, where no earth is available for the Earthbenders to use against their captors. Subverted, in a way, because the Earthbenders spend years in the camp without fighting back. The Firebenders' stupidity was turned Up to Eleven, but the Earthbenders' stupidity was turned Up to Twelve.

Magic A Is Magic A: An interesting look at how this trope works. While the show never portrayed Firebending inconsistently (and specified that Firebenders derive their powers from the Sun Spirit just as Waterbenders derive theirs from the Moon Spirit, and pull Chi energy from their surroundings and their own bodies), the film changed it so that (like the other bending arts) they have to have a source of fire instead of forming it from nothing. Master Firebenders can still create their own fire, so all in all only the logistics are different. Their war strategy now involves sending flaming boulders into enemy territory so that their front line troops can bend it, among other things.

Magitek: There is a great deal more emphasis on the Fire Nation technology (made possible by Firebending), frequent mention is made of "their machines" and how difficult it was for the other bending arts to fight against them. The Siege of the North involved a fire cannon that singularly punched a hole through the Northern Tribe wall and soldiers used a drilling device to emerge underneath the feet of Water Tribe soldiers.

Market-Based Title: The movie was going to be called The Legend of Aang in many European markets, to match the original show's Market-Based Title of Avatar: The Legend of Aang. The name was originally changed because "bender" is a British derogatory slang term for a gay person. This did not come to pass; the title remains The Last Airbender in all English-speaking markets.

Mighty Whitey: Due to the racebending of the main three characters, particularly since it seems like all the extras are Asian. Makes it even clearer when only the heroes seemed to realize the Earthbenders could use the earth in the quarry to fight the Firebenders who had only one fire pit in the middle of the quarry to fight back with.

Missing Trailer Scene: Many; especially anything with the Warriors of Kyoshi, whose entire story was cut. The entire teaser was not even meant for the original movie. This got to the point where entire TV spots for the film were made of footage never seen in the film itself.

Mundane Made Awesome: During the Earthbenders' fight against the Fire Nation, six of them stomped the yard and did several Tai Chi poses … all so that one additional guy can throw a pebble.

Mythology Gag: Early in the movie, Kanna name-drops Hama as the last Waterbender taken away by the Fire Nation. Zhao references ransacking the Spirit Library to get the info about the Ocean and Moon spirits (this was also referenced by the show's Zhao, the characters then visit that library in season two). And though Haru's name isn't actually mentioned, it's pretty clear who he is.

Narrating the Obvious: The film spends a great deal of time with Katara describing what's happening on screen as we watch it happening.

Nerf: All bending is significantly weaker than it is in the show. Even their basic moves require complicated katas to perform, and their results are often underwhelming. Firebending got it worst, however; firebenders can no longer create their own fire, and require an external source to bend. This required their enemies to grab onto the Idiot Ball several times and not extinguish the sources of fire required for bending.

Never Trust a Trailer: TV promos for the film were dominated by lengthy trailers devoted to showing that the movie was available in "mind-blowing" 3D. Even showing an audience gasping and ducking from the four elements jumping from the screen. Despite the fact it was shot in 2D and the tacked on "3D" effects were barely noticeable and earned a Razzie.

Not His Sled: The ending in the movie is radically different from Book 1 of the series. The killing of the Moon Spirit somehow did not trigger anger from the Ocean Spirit. Worse, Aang was busy attacking Fire Nation soldiers when he was supposed to merge with the Ocean Spirit to become Koizilla. With no Koizilla, all we get is a giant tsunami that did not sink Fire Nation ships, mainly because of the Dragon Spirit's "the Avatar is not supposed to harm anyone" theory.

The Oner: The battle between the Earthbenders and the Fire Nation. Also doubles as Fight Scene Failure as you can see in the backgound several extras standing around waiting for their cues.

Prequel: In the form of the 100-page manga Zuko's Story, which draws Iroh and Zuko in the style of the film's actors but otherwise seems to take place in the original cartoon's continuity.

Race Lift: This film was pretty guilty of "racebending" many of the main characters:

In the show, the Fire Nation had people that look like East Asians, both pale (such as Zuko) and tan (such as Jeong Jeong), but the actors in the movie are from a variety of ethnicities — Maori, Arab, Persian, and South Asian.

Monk Gyatso, who looked Tibetan (Gyatso is in fact the name of the Dalai Lama), became black in the movie.

Sokka and Katara, like most Water Tribe characters, have Mukokuseki features: tan skin, brown hair and blue eyes. Because their culture is based on Inuits, however, many viewers think of them as Asian or Native American. In the film, they are played by white actors with brown hair and eyes.

Background extras often don't particularly match the ethnicities of the main characters of their tribes. The Water Nation tribe appear to be played by Asian and/or Inuit actors. There are a few white people with brown hair in large crowds of the Fire Nation.

Red Eyes, Take Warning: Just before Iroh gives Zhao a demonstration of just how badass he is, the irises of his eyes take on a very red color.

Separated by a Common Language: In the United Kingdom, "bender" is a derogatory term for a male homosexual. Consequently, the dialogue's frequent reference to characters being benders tended to make British audiences giggle. It gives a whole new hilarious sub-meaning to the phrase: "I could tell at once that you were a bender, and that you would realize your destiny."

Show, Don't Tell: Inversion — narration replaces a lot of things from the first season.

Spell My Name with an "S": The second word of "Agni Kai" is pronounced like the first half of "kayak" in the show but "key" here, to the point that the Zuko's Story prequel comic book ends up spelling it with no "A".

Take Our Word for It: Sokka's relationship with Yue. When they first showed up in the North Pole, both Sokka and Yue instantly lock eyes. Cue a Katara voiceover stating that "my brother and the princess became friends right away." And then the next scene, he's her bodyguard.

The Northern Water Tribes count as this. Since the Firebenders need torches to bend fire, Pakku suggests extinguishing all of them to render them powerless … which they never actually do. Most likely because in the series they don't need the torches (it's their main advantage in fact), so having it actually work would require massive story changes.

The Fire Nation imprisoned some Earthbenders in a quarry surrounded by convenient rocks, which they ultimately use to escape. Shyamalan explained that they were too dispirited to try to escape beforehand.

Trailers Always Spoil: Most trailers show the climax of the movie, and several have shots of Yue sacrificing herself in the Spirit Oasis.

You Don't Look Like You: Several characters, but especially Ozai. Made even worse when you remember that in Zuko's family picture earlier, his appearance is more appropriate to the series…

Iroh: There are a lot of pretty girls here Zuko. You could settle down here, and you could have a blessed life. You don't have to continue this Zuko. Prince Zuko: …We'll catch [the Avatar] soon Uncle, then we could think about the pretty girls.

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